


Even the Air is Poison

by Ironlawyer



Category: Marvel 616
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Dark, Emotional Manipulation, First Time, Hydra Steve Rogers, M/M, NSFW Art, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-05
Updated: 2020-02-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:08:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22577557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ironlawyer/pseuds/Ironlawyer
Summary: Tony wakes from his coma to Steve by his side. The life he's always wanted seems to be finally coming his way. Except there's something Steve isn't telling him.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 28
Kudos: 244
Collections: Captain America/Iron Man Reverse Bang 2019





	Even the Air is Poison

**Author's Note:**

> This is my extremely late story for the 2019 CapIM RBB. Thank you to Narukyuu for your unending patience. Your art is so amazing and inspiring and I'm so sorry it was such a long wait for this story. 
> 
> Link to the art to come. 
> 
> Thank you also to Kiyaar for giving this a look over.

He is dizzy, breathless, nauseous. Altitude sick, but there’s no altitude. No armour. Just a bed beneath him and sterile white light above. A frantic stream of anonymous white coats come and go, blurs in his hazy vision. He wants to tell the world to stop. Back to sleep, closes his eye. They’re pulled open to a penlight stabbing like a butter knife into his eyeballs. A noise, a word, a voice. A muffled shout. Commanding. Familiar. Get out of here, morons. He has the desperate urge to punch someone, but his arms are heavy and stiff like he’s being restrained by his own body.

The noise quiets, the light dims. He settles into his own body again. Thoughts lapse like waves, a crash of anxiety and then calm again. Where, when, how. Steve.

Flashes of the fight with Carol. He lost, he supposes. Lost but survived, because he always seems to hang around to witness his failures.

He feels himself numbing, his brain drifting away from him again. He fights it, like he always does but the pull of unconsciousness is too strong.

‘It’s okay Tony, sleep, now. You’re back with us. Everything is going to be okay this time, I promise.’

Promise. He likes the sound of that. Promise, he mouths the word, doesn’t mean to speak, just enjoys the way it feels on his tongue, but Steve squeezes his fingers. ‘I promise,’ he repeats.

Tony trusts Steve. Tony lets the pull drag him under.

\--

‘Time to wake up, Avenger. You going to open your eyes again for me?’

Waking to the sound of Steve’s voice is calming. It takes him a moment to notice the restraints. His heart judders, but he’s with Steve. He is safe. He belongs. He is an Avengers and Steve is by his side. His life is defined by moments like this. Capturing them in his brainwaves, storing them to playback in his memory like he still has Extremis. Steve and Steve and it is always Steve. He thinks sometimes that this is what it’s like to truly love someone – a dopy smile and a lightness in his chest every time Steve looks at him.

‘Sorry about these,’ Steve says. A sharp tug at the strap around his wrist. ‘Nightmares or something, I suppose, you wouldn’t stop struggling.’

Tony tugs at the distant mist of near forgotten dreams lingering in his brain. Goosesteps, salute, a twisted mirror of Steve’s smile, a familiar uniform in new colours. Hail Hydra. It’s fading fast already, with Steve smiling in civvies by his bedside.

‘Sorry about that. Weird dream.’

‘It’s okay, not unexpected. You’ve been out for quite some time.’

‘How long?’

Steve shakes his head, his smile turns mournful. Tony thinks of Steve in the ice, waking up to a world that left him behind. He imagines Iron Man wouldn’t remain so relevant in a changed future.

‘It doesn’t matter now, Tony. You’re back with me, that’s what matters.’

Of course it fucking matters. He doesn’t say it, because Steve means no harm. Steve’s been waiting for this, and Tony knows what it’s like to be the one left behind.

‘I went through so much to have you here with me,’ Steve tells him and Tony feels lead in his stomach, feels grateful and guilty and lost and wants to say, you shouldn’t have gone through anything. I’m not worth it. He says nothing, because it would be a disservice to Steve, to his effort, to his faith in Tony.

Steve gestures to the IV dripping something florescent into Tony’s veins. ‘Some of the finest doctors have been working on a way to get you right.’

Tony watches the drip, drip of some cocktail of experimental drugs running into his system and keeping him present in the world. He thinks of the countless families across the globe, sitting bedside vigil for comatose loved one, hoping, praying, never giving up. He wants to ask why him, but it’s Steve and by some standard, Tony is considered a friend and a hero and a celebrity, so of course it’s him. Tony Stark excels at getting his two dozen second chances. Second chances to live a better life - second chances to fuck everything up.

Of course it’s him.

‘I missed you, Tony,’ Steve says. He reaches for Tony’s hand, squeezes his fingers and it feels like the world mean more. ‘Everything will be okay this time.’

There have always been so many things holding them back, but Tony no longer cares about any of that, because this is Steve, because this feels so natural, it feels like this is what his life was always meant to be.

‘I missed you, too.’ He knows what this feels like from the other side. So many times he’s crumbled without Steve in his life.

‘We’re both here now.’ Steve is still holding his hand, like he can’t let go or they’ll lose each other all over again. ‘A lot has changed since you fell into that coma, Tony,’ he says. ‘You showed me a new world once, now it’s my turn to show one to you.’

He thinks of those early days, how quickly Steve adapted and made the modern world his own. It can’t have been so long, Tony’s looks at his hands but his skin is still young. He thinks of the past few years and the breakneck speed their lives now run at. It could have been a week and he might’ve missed just as much.

‘Please, Steve, how long was I --’

Steve hushes him again and Tony fights the touch of painful frustration tensing him up. His fingers clench and he wants to argue, but his words are gone. His eyes focus one last time on Steve, and he sees the syringe in his hand. Something pumped into his IV. He wants to resent it, but he’s tired and Steve is only doing what he thinks is best.

‘One thing at a time, Tony,’ he says, like Tony can’t take this, like he hasn’t handled infinitely more difficult news time and time again. ‘I think you should rest now.’

Tony doesn’t have a choice.

\--

He’s been lying in the silent darkness for hours. Blackout blinds are heavy across the only window in the room. It’s a good place for rest and yet he feels off balance, itchy and light, like if he wasn’t restrained he’d float away. He belongs somewhere else, he thinks, but doesn’t know where the thought comes from or where he is supposed to be. He wonders if the Steve from before was a dream.

Something beeps. A machine lights up. He begins to feel heavy. He was thinking about something important. Maybe. He forgets what. It doesn’t seem to matter anymore.

Everything will be okay this time.

\--

Steve is by his bedside again. Different clothes, hint of stubble. Soft warm light creeping in from the doorway and lighting him from behind. He looks fuzzy around the edges, like an illusion.

‘Can you smell it, Tony?’ Steve asks and Tony is baffled for a moment. There’s a bowl in Steve’s hands, steam wafting from hot soup. He thinks of their early days in the mansion, drinking Steve’s homemade soup through a straw during Avengers lunch breaks, because Steve’s home cooking was too good to pass up. ‘Come on Tony, what do you smell?’

It’s not the familiar smell of Steve’s recipe, it’s something mass produced, tasteless probably. Unappetising at the best of times. ‘Peppers,’ Tony says. ‘I hate peppers.’

Steve smiles a little. Soft, warm, like Tony is a child who’s just said something cute. ‘Just try a little. It’s been a long time, we need to see if your stomach can handle it. Please.’

And even though he feels ill at the prospect of food, he’s cant refuse Steve such a simple request. Tony nods. Steve spoons mouthful after mouthful of tasteless soup down Tony’s throat and Tony swallows without protest. It’s intimate, but not in the way Tony has always hoped for. He feels like a invalid, a child, a burden.

‘Good,’ Steve says when the bowl is empty. ‘You’re getting there. How are you feeling?’

‘I’m fine, Steve,’ Tony says, but he feels flat, steamrolled, like he’s made of something hollow and his body had been inflated with nothing but air. ‘Fine,’ he repeats, but a little less sure this time.

Steve sets the empty bowl aside and runs a hand through Tony’s hair. There’s a further intimacy to it, something that feels beyond friendship and Tony wishes his mind wouldn’t wonder to fantasy whenever Steve’s around.

‘What’s wrong, Tony?’ Steve asks after a moment, his fingers still splayed in Tony’s hair.

Steve can read him, of course. Tony has a lifetime of acting to back him up, but near Steve these days his emotional façade turns into a thin veneer.

‘I’m tired, I guess.’ Tired. It’s bone deep and there not enough rest to cure him of it. He’s soul tired. Maybe it would have been better if he stayed in that coma.

He sees the doubt in Steve’s eyes. They know each other too well.

‘You’ve been sleeping a long time.’ Steve averts his eyes for a moment. ‘You know, Tony, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking while you were out.’

Without further explanation, Steve leans in and Tony lets it happen, telling himself he’s misunderstanding right till the moment Steve’s lips touch his. Tony wants to let it happen, wants to kiss back, wants to let his hand drift up and grip the back of Steve’s neck. Wants to let himself pretend he deserves this.

He starts to move his arms. Tug, pull, twinge of pain against bruised wrists. He’s still restrained. He draws a hissed breath beneath Steve’s lips and Steve draws back, smiling still.

‘I want you to be a part of my life. No matter how many battles I win, or what I do to help the world, I need you to be complete.’

And the restraints don’t seem so important anymore. There’s a twinge of something unreal in it all, like Tony is going to wake up and find it was all another dream. He wants to ask Steve why he never said anything before. Why they wasted all these years. But Tony never said anything either. They both played their part in this charade of friendship.

Tony nods. Wordless, breathless. Hazy dreams long passed drifting back to him, closer to reality now. A life he always wanted and never got. A life he never dreamed he’d get but has found somehow.

‘I need you too, Steve,’ Tony says.

Steve smiles a hunter’s smile and Tony wonders for a moment if he is the pray, but it’s there and gone in a moment and perhaps he imagined it, perhaps his brain won’t let him have happy moments untainted.

Steve kisses him again and it feels strangely distant, like he’s sealing a deal, proving a point. It’s less than a lover’s kiss, but maybe it’s too soon to expect that.

Steve gathers the bowl, turns off the bedside lamp, pulls the blanket high over Tony’s naked shoulders and does not release the restraints.

Tony doesn’t feel tired anymore, but Steve doesn’t ask him again. ‘Wait,’ Tony says as Steve gets up to leave, ‘we should talk.’ But Steve has already left Tony alone with his thoughts in the darkness.

\--

Tony doesn’t know what time it is. He can’t see the clock on the wall and the blackout blinds stop the sun coming through. No one comes or goes, nothing marks the time. He hears footsteps just beyond the door every few minutes and is never sure if his imagination is reaching or if whoever’s on the other side is ignoring him. His limbs are stiff and restless. He wants to move, he wants to breathe fresh air and see the open sky.

He wants Steve to come back again.

Tick, tick, tick. The clock across the room gets louder and louder. Counting the seconds because he’s not tired anymore, he can’t sleep, he can’t move. He can only wait and count and lose count and start over.

He pictures Steve and that kiss on a loop. It’s distant now, less like a memory, more like a delusion. Maybe he’s lost it. Maybe he’s tired and desperate and he wants this enough that his mind conjured it up. He wants to scream but before he can, the door cracks open slowly, letting in a sliver of light.

‘Tony? Are you awake?’ He hears the low familiar voice before his eyes adjust.

‘Steve?’ Tony stumbles over the word like it’s a prayer.

‘Sorry about the wait,’ Steve says like he’s a little late for an appointment. He flicks the lights on without warning, and Tony winces as his eyes react.

Tony want to say it’s fine, but there’s a sting of loneliness, of betrayal, the taunt of their last moment together lingering and festering in his brain and feeling more and more like a delusion with every passing second.

‘Where were you?’

‘I have a lot of important things to do, Tony. I can’t spend all my time with you.’

It stings but Tony has no right to question it. He’s never been the most important thing in Steve’s life and never will be, not like Steve is in his. He’s accepted that long ago.

Steve sits down at the edge of the bed, his hand rests over Tony’s. It shocks him in a way, because it’s intimate, perhaps more so than the kiss – he’s kissed a lot of people, far fewer have touched him like this.

‘I’m here now though,’ Steve says, the warmth in his voice unmistakable and Tony questions it all for a moment. So many thoughts and wishes of this and he’s strapped to a bed, delusional maybe. Maybe this whole thing is the last wish of his dying brain or some fucked up mind trick.

‘Are you, though?’ He wishes he could believe in this, but nothing adds up. He hasn’t seen a single doctor since he woke up.

‘Am I what?’

‘Here. Are you really here, Steve?’

Steve smiles at him, brilliant and shocking and a hint of something smug beneath, and for a moment, Tony wonders who he’s looking at. Steve’s hand moves from Tony’s, slides across his hip and comes to rest on Tony thigh, a hair’s breadth from Tony’s dick. ‘I am more real than I have ever been, Tony. I want you to see me for who I am. See the side of my that I’ve always kept buried. I’m tired of hiding my real self from you. Please,’ he says, and it’s not begging really, or a genuine request for permission, it’s a token offered so Tony can pretend he still has some control here, ‘let me show you?’ Steve asks, and Tony nods.

Steve’s fingers creep up, rub against Tony’s dick above the blanket. It shouldn’t be like this, Tony thinks briefly, so many years culminating in a quick fling in a hospital bed, because they’re horny and neither of them know what it’s like to be functional in love. Tony wants it too much to care. ‘Steve.’ He gasps as Steve’s fingers pull away, but Steve laughs softly.

‘I’m going to fuck you,’ Steve says and it’s not a question, or a request. Like it doesn’t matter what Tony says because they both already know he’d never say no. And Tony doesn’t. ‘I’ve waited for this,’ Steve says, ‘watching you lying here for so long, I thought I’d missed my chance.’

Steve pulls the blanket back and runs his hands across Tony’s chest. ‘I won’t miss out again.’

Tony tugs lightly on the bonds, a gentle reminder that he can’t participate in this properly, but Steve is in his own world. He touches Tony, watches Tony, feels Tony, but Tony feels like Steve never sees him at all. Like he wants so much he’s going to take it no matter what, and Tony wants to ask him to stop just to see if he will. But of course he would; he’s Captain America.

Maybe if this were different, they’d be lying together, home, comfortable. It’s quick and desperate, and Tony hears between Steve’s ragged breathing the low sound of his voice. ‘You’re alive,’ he says, ‘you’re mine and you’re alive and you trust me and everything will be alright this time.’ And the words aren’t really meant for him, but Tony understands and won’t deny him, because he’s dreamed of this and now he knows, Steve has too.

Tony knows how much Steve needs this, how much he needs to feel some connection between them, how much he needs to let out all that pain and fear and loneliness. This started for Tony’s sake, but now, it’s like Steve needs to fuck Tony to believe he is really here.

It’s all hands and sharp movements and the room is cold without his blanket, but Steve is warm and close and Tony is drawn into it. He feels like he is leaving his body behind. Giving himself over to Steve. It’s sloppy, unsure, Steve’s hands roaming up and down his body like he has to feel every part of him. A hand resting on his chest feelings his breath and the beat of his heart, as if to reassure himself, Tony is alive. He is alive and breathing unaided. He is alive and breathing and conscious and here beneath Steve.

Tony knows that need and knows that he is a coward because he could never act on it, the way Steve is now.

He lays back and lets Steve do what he wants, what he needs, and he thinks of his own needs and wants and they feel no different. What Steve needs, Tony needs. What Steve wants, Tony wants.

They both come quick. Years of holding back, years of wanting and not having and now Tony has Steve here with him, something more than a friend. Something… something. He doesn’t quite dare put a name to it yet, because it’s just sex, sex and a kiss and Tony knows well enough that that doesn’t have to mean anything more.

But it could mean something.

‘I want to touch you,’ Tony says because he has to know what it feels like. He has to hold onto this moment before it disappears back to the confines of his imagination.

Steve is breathless, sweat slick shoulders shining in the iridescent lights. He lays on top of Tony as Tony tugs at the bonds around his wrists, reaching, so close to touching Steve. He trusts him, doesn’t feel the same background buzz of fear he’d feel with anyone else.

Tony loves him, he thinks. The last time he felt like this was Rumiko and the sting it still leaves when he thinks of her tells him that was love.

Steve looks at him, and Tony swears Steve can read it in him like he’s yelling it from the rooftop. ‘Beg,’ Steve says, and this is not how Tony has expected it to go. He blinks up at Steve and processes the breathless smirk and sweat on his brow, the way his body moves like he belongs to Tony. Tony feels powerful and powerless. He has a hold on Steve that he has never had before, but Steve too, has a new hold on him. He is tempted to call it the beginning of something. This is new and he wants to approach it with caution but he’s already three feet deep.

‘Please, Steve, please. Let me touch you.’ Tony thinks he would do anything Steve asks of him right now. But that is all Steve wants of him.

Steve leans over and kisses him, the smell of Tony’s come still on his breath. ‘You’d like that’s huh?’ Steve whispers against his lips. Steve is fondling Tony’s balls, but his hand moves now, up to the restraints. He pulls them loose, snaps the leather effortlessly. It’s teasing almost, a reminder of how little power Tony has in comparison.

When his hands are free at last, Tony reaches for Steve, wants to feel his muscles moving as he breathes. Steve grabs his wrist, holds it just short of touching, stares at him, soft and lazy. ‘Tell me what you’re thinking, Tony.’

‘I want to make you happy.’ That’s all it comes to in the end. What he has wanted since they found Steve that day in the ice. He hasn’t always got what he wanted, but today, maybe he can.

‘What would you do, Tony? What would you do to make me happy?’

There are things he wouldn’t do, maybe, but he can’t think of them now. Steve is touching him. Steve is his anchor to the world right now and Tony thinks he wouldn’t have it any other way.

‘Anything,’ Tony says, and means it more than he should. Steve smiles, kisses him again, releases his hand and let’s Tony touch him.

He lingers, wants to touch Steve as Steve touched him, but he’s tired and spent and his body is not used to moving anymore. His sluggish fingers drag down Steve’s chest, but his arm is heavy and he can’t hold it up. ‘There’ll be other days, Tony,’ Steve tells him. ‘Rest. I’ll stay with you.’

Steve rolls over, wedged up next to him on the cramped bed. Tony feels a little claustrophobic, even with the cuffs off. This is the start of something and Tony isn’t sure what. He’s been orbiting around the edges of Steve’s affection for years and this time he can’t resist the pull. He wants to run away and he wants to never leave Steve’s side again.

The air is full of the smell of their come and Steve’s sweat, the window is closed and still blocked by the blind and Tony is filled with the sudden urge to be outside, to see the world he’s missed out on and yet it feels cruel to want it now, with Steve here. It would be like telling him he isn’t enough.

He watches the crack of light beneath the door, feels when Steve falls asleep beside him. He considers getting up, seeing the world that Steve is scared to show him. He would have once, perhaps, but Steve is gently snoring beside him and Tony is tired of facing the world alone. He rolls over to watch Steve, feel his heartbeat, his breathing, his body heat and indulge in the intimacy of it.

\--

Tony rouses slowly to the march of feet outside his door. A knock, and Steve jolts awake from where he still lies next to Tony. There’s a touch of artificial calm in Tony burying down the instinct that something is wrong. Something is always wrong.

Steve yawns and stretches and smiles at him. He looks so different in the post sleep haze, like the stresses of being a soldier have been washed away. ‘Good morning, Tony.’

He feels a sudden urgency to warn Steve. A nurse, a doctor, a journalist, and one could have walked in on them like this and sold the story to the tabloids. ‘Someone’s at the door.’

Steve’s smile fades instantly and Tony wishes they were as brave as they pretended to be. Steve rises quickly and walks to the door. ‘I’ll just see if it’s important. You need rest.’

Steve holds the door only slightly ajar, so Tony can’t see who’s on the other side. They talk in hushed but sharp voices and Steve slams the door with a frustration that echoes through his whole body in a wave of tension.

The vision of it feels off - off, like he’s looking at the world through a shattered lens and all of the details are slightly wonky. Steve is off. He walks a little different now, like his boots are too tight. His jawline is harsher, tighter, like he’s finally seen so much shit that he’s forgotten how to loosen it up. It’s not quite the Steve Tony know, but so close, like seeing him sideways. He wonders what else has changed. He wonders why he didn’t notice it before.

‘Is something wrong?’ Tony asks.

‘Nothing you should worry yourself with.’

‘I want to know what’s going on, Steve. You can’t hide me away from the world in here forever.’

‘I know. Its just... I’m not sure if you’re ready yet. I don’t want to lose you again.’

‘You of all people should know that hiding things from each other is the quickest way to do that.’ Bringing up the war he only remembers from newspaper headlines and talk show clips is dirty, but Tony doesn’t want to lose Steve any more than Steve wants to lose him.

Steve looks shaken for a moment, then he steps closer, within arms reach. He leans close. ‘You’re right, Tony. I don’t want us to ever fight on different sides again. You don’t either, do you? ‘

At the prospect, Tony’s stomach feels like he is dangling upside down over a ledge. He shakes his head but can’t get the words out.

‘I suppose I need to show you this,’ Steve says. ‘I hope you’ll take it as intended.’ He cups Tony’s cheek, kisses him briefly on the lips, then takes his hand and helps him up from the bed. ‘You are my Tony Stark. Don’t make me lose you again.’

The breathless joy of it envelopes him, because in Steve’s on words, Tony is his. Tony is at Steve’s whims and he wonders if he always has been. He resents his own vulnerability and around Steve, he’s always had something to prove, like a little kid who wants the popular boy to like him, he has always craved Steve’s approval.

Tony straightens his back, flashes a toothy grin and pulls Steve into a deeper kiss, like he doesn’t care what’s beyond that door, because he has this and nothing can take that away from him. As long as he keeps control of the urgency of his own curiosity, they will be fine.

‘I want this Steve, you won’t lose me.’

‘Do you trust me, Tony?’

‘More than I trust myself.’ He’s shook by his own words. If Steve suggested they turn away now, he would. Let them bury whatever secret’s he’s keeping behind that locked door, go to bed, fuck until the memory is trivial, and only bring it up as a joke ten years down the line when it has become as unimportant to what their lives will be, as that mix up with that shapeshifter is to what their lives are now.

Steve takes his hand and leads him down the deserted hallway to a viewing room. The lights are dimmed, and the windows blanked out.

‘I didn’t want to have to show you this,’ Steve says with a softness Tony has heard countless times when Steve speaks to scared children and wounded civilians. It’s never been directed at him before. ‘I think you should sit down.’

Tony does as he’s told. Steve turns the lights up and dims the windows. There’s nothing outside but a barren wasteland, a canyon in the middle of the desert.

‘Las Vagas,’ Steve says, simply.

‘Jesus. Fuck.’ Tony has no better words. He gets up, steps closer to the windows, examining the sight before him like if he looks close enough he’ll spot some sign of life. ‘What happened?’

‘A... War, I suppose you could say. A group of rogues, law breakers, who didn’t know when to stop.’

‘They did this?’

‘They caused it, yes.’

‘Fuck.’

‘A tragic loss of life, but lessons have been learned. It sounds callous to reduce it to this, but the world is a better place for it.’

‘Jesus, Steve. How did this happen? Ultron? Osborne? Hydra?’

‘There’s a lot of context you need to understand. You see, this was a long time coming, but we were all too blinded by the idea that we were the good guys, the heroes.’

‘What does that mean?’

But Steve never has a chance to answer. A klaxon goes off, and the door swings open and a single Hydra soldier steps inside.

The words Hail Hydra are barely out of the soldier’s mouth before Tony tackles him to the ground.

The soldier doesn’t put up much of a struggle, just lies on the floor and tries to swat Tony away as Tony tries to get him pinned. ‘A little help here, Cap?’ It’s not like Steve to react to a surprise attack with inaction, but Tony can’t blame him.

‘Commander, sir,’ the soldier speaks past Tony’s shoulder, and Tony almost loses his grip as he turns to see who else is there, ‘can you get this fool off of me? You’re needed urgently in conference room B.’

Steve grabs Tony’s arms and yanks him to his feet. ‘You moron. You absolute fucking moron.’ It takes Tony a moment to find his balance and realise Steve is talking to the Hydra goon. ‘I told you and I told you again.’

‘Sir, please, I wouldn’t have but it’s important.’

‘Get on your knees.’

The man does so, he kneels in front of Steve and clasps his hands like he is praying. Tony can see the fire in Steve’s eyes and the fear from the Hydra soldier, it passes over him like mist, he sees and hears but does not absorb. It’s like nonsense speak, an abstract painting he can’t figure out.

‘Please, sir,’ the Hydra soldier begs, ‘I have a son.’

‘Then you’d better pray he turns out brighter than you.’ Steve pulls out a pistol and shoots the guy between the eyes. Blood flies as he falls and splashes of it land on Tony’s face and gown, painting him with a violence unlike any he’s seen from Steve before.

Dreamy, dazed, he stands over the body and watches the man’s skull draining out across the cream carpet. The strain won’t come out and the whole carpet will need to be replaced. Whoever picked cream must’ve been an idiot.

Tony has killed before. Tony has seen Steve kill before. The man lying at his feet wears a Hydra uniform and probably would have killed them both given the chance. Surely.

But...

Steve steps over and looks down at the body. ‘Bastard,’ he says. Then with a venom that is nothing like the Steve Tony has always known, he stomps on the man’s skull and it splinters and collapses beneath his boot like fragile glass. ‘And it was going so well this time,’ he says with a sigh.

Tony can hear his heart beating, it’s louder than it ought to be, thrumming in his ears like a heavy drum beat in the otherwise silence. Maybe it’s just a moment, but it stretches out thin and long like taffy being pulled and it doesn’t break until Steve speaks again.

‘I’m sorry you had to see that, Tony.’ He doesn’t sound sorry, he sounds irritated.

‘What the fuck just happened? Why did you do that? Why are there Hydra soldiers here? Who was he talking to?’ It feels like his brain is in hyper drive, thoughts spiralling too quickly around him to grab a hold of. He’s losing his breath. He’s losing his mind.

Steve sighs. ‘I think we should go back to your room.’

‘I’m not going back to my room. Tell me what the fuck is going on?’

‘Tony, please. I promise I’ll explain everything but it’s a long story and you’re still not well.’

And as Steve says it, Tony feels it. His stagnated limbs shaking with the effort to stay standing, the aura of a migraine building, the stench of death adding to the roll of nausea in his gut. He’s one step away from passing out and landing in the guys leaking brain matter.

‘Fucking hell.’ Tony sighs, rubs his brow and let’s Steve approach him. He’s not in any position to make demands.

Steve slings Tony’s arm across his shoulder, carries him out on jelly legs before Tony can protest further. If he’s honest with himself, Tony wants to walk away from the violence too, it’s not an image he wants in his head when he thinks of Steve.

He feels the world shattering inside of him. He tries to blink it away like a vision he can dispel, but it stays crystal every time he opens his eyes.

‘It’s a different world now, Tony, sometimes tough choices have got to be made in the interest of the greater good. That’s something you once tried to teach me.’

Tony tunes out the words, puts one foot in front of the other and tried not to dwell on the image of a man begging on his knees for his life.

\--

‘You need to take your medication, Tony.’

He glances at the empty IV hanging limply, doesn’t remember when it was removed, and feels conflicted by the uncertainty of what he’s just seen and the knowledge that Steve loves him.

‘What medication? What’s it for?’

Steve sighs. ‘We don’t need the IV. It’s just a shot, Tony, to make sure I don’t lose you again.’ Steve prepares the needle as he speaks, fills it, taps it, then tucks the bottle in the bedside drawer.

‘Tell me what’s going on first.’

Steve jabs him in the shoulder and almost instantly Tony feels his consciousness drifting away. He’s stripped and gagged and all he can manage in protest is a twitch of his fingers.

As he drifts to sleep the last thing he hears is, ‘I’m sorry it had to be this way, Tony, next time will be better. I promise.’

\--

He awakes somewhere cold, abrasive bed sheets beneath him. It’s not the same bed, maybe not the same room. He’s blindfolded and gagged and the restraints around his wrist and ankles chafe. He struggles against the bonds to little effect.

‘Shhh. Everything will be fine soon.’ Steve’s voice sounds echoic, like they’re in a cave or a cell and Steve is watching from above. Footsteps approach.

‘You understand how important you are to me, don’t you, Tony?’ Tony tries to speak, to say fuck you or spit in this mirror man’s face, but the gag limits him to choked hissing. ‘I can give you a better life.’ Steve rests his hand on Tony’s arm just above the restraint. ‘That’s all I’m trying to do. I hope one day soon you’ll understand. I’d like to kiss you now.’

Tony laughs beneath the gag, but after a long moment of silence, he realises Steve is serious.

Gently, warm fingers tug at the edges of the blindfold and the gag, pull them down out of the way.

‘You’re not Steve,’ Tony says as soon as the gag is out of the way.

Steve sighs. ‘I am. I’m not a skrull or a shapeshifter or under mind control or whatever you’re thinking. Perhaps I’m a little different than how you knew me before, but I’m the same man, just truer, better. I remember my truth and I want to share it with you. I will share it with you, soon enough.’

He feels Steve getting closer, leaning in for his kiss, his breath ghosting Tony’s cheek. ‘Don’t fucking touch me.’ He never thought he’d be so repulsed by the thought of Steve kissing him.

‘I’ll do as I like. See, I brought you back from that coma and I can return you to it any time I choose.’

‘You think that’s a threat? Better in a coma, better dead, than whatever you are.’

Steve laughs. ‘Hydra dear, I am the Hydra Supreme and I have waited for our victory for a very long time.’

‘You think you’re going to convince me to join Hydra if you threaten to kill me?

‘No, no. I’m not so simple minded, Tony, I thought you knew me better. See in a few days, you’re going to slowly drift back into a coma. The next time you wake, you won’t remember any of this. Right here, right now, I can do anything I like to you and soon you won’t even know. You’ll wake and I will show you our new world and you’ll come to know this is for the best.’

Steve marks this gloating with a kiss. Everything Tony has always wanted his life to be; illusion shattered, mirror cracked. Steve who is not Steve. How many times has he seen people replaced or controlled before and yet he believed. Believed that he was important, believed that he was invincible, believed that he was loved.

Steve has brought life to him, like Frankenstein. Tony is Steve’s monster. His soul had crumbled to dust somewhere along the line and Steve was going to plant seeds in the left over soil and watch them grow.

Tony thinks of biting his tongue, of spitting in his face. He wishes he could put a repulsor to his head before he drifts back into that coma because he has never feared dying as much as he has feared betraying himself.

Tony likes to imagine it will go like this, time and time again, that he will never be persuaded and maybe eventually this shadow of Steve will see that and kill him. But then, he thinks of what Steve could do unchecked. He thinks of the itching needle of manipulation, the way Steve dipped his toes into the waters of Tony’s mind before throwing himself in. The way Tony was falling so fast under his spell before the hydra goon made his mistake.

Time is just a concept. Whatever long days and nights lay before him, they will end. He believe this because he needs to believe this. He is a bogged down with the memories of a man that will soon disappear. There is a certain cruel self indulgence in how much relief that brings.

Steve pulls back from the kiss and smiles a butcher’s smile. There’s blood in his teeth, and Tony wonders why he didn’t taste of it. He feels the wetness dripping down his own lip.

‘Sorry, guess I got a bit carried away.’ Steve runs a tentative finger across Tony’s lip and Tony feels the sting of it. Broken, tender, raw.

Steve pulls his finger back, looks at the blood on it, his face remains neutral. Tony’s seen his blood on Steve’s hands before. It’s different, but not so different. It’s right he thinks, that Steve should hurt him here too; hurt his body like he’s hurting his heart.

Tony wonders what drives this Steve. What makes Tony so important to Steve’s empire.

Is it only that determination to see something through, no matter the cost, or how long it takes? It would be a lot like Steve on the surface.

Steve smiles at him, and Tony thinks, perhaps he knew him better than he thought. Drawn to him, burned by his flame because he saw something in his soul hidden deep, a darkness that has never been there in the real Steve, an imperfection that finally made him attainable. Deep down there’s something rotten in them both.

‘What are you going to do now?’ Tony asks him, like he wants to know, like he’s still capable of caring, like these bodies means anything.

‘I’m going to make you mine. For tonight, in body only, but soon, in body and mind for the rest of our lives.’

He imagines another life when he has forgotten all this - nights where Steve calls him in to witness the suffering of traitors, to paint a smile on his face and take Steve’s hand willingly and act like this is a kindness, a joy to be shared, like an evening at the opera. To hear screams reverberating through the room with the faint unspoken threat that, ‘this could be you, if you step out of line.’

And maybe in that life he will like to watch the whole world burn.

Now though, Steve will take what’s his and in his mind, Tony is his. It’s okay though, it’s just flesh. It’s just blood and sex and it doesn’t mean a thing, because it isn’t Steve and in the morning he won’t be Tony.

Rocking, rocking. The world beneath him like a shadow. Okay, okay, okay; like it’s the only word he can remember. Okay, okay, okay. Just flesh and blood. Just bone and blood and flesh and - fuck, fuck, fuck.

He doesn’t want to remember how to want. He wants to be a husk. Flick the off switch in his brain; he used to do that, with Extremis. Systems shutting down.

Pain, pain, pain and then nothing, nothing, nothing.

He can hear Steve, he can see him. He can feel his body aching. He feels nothing.

He smiles a little. Steve is too busy to notice. He lets his soft focus on the worlds drift away. He could sleep maybe. He wonder is Steve would stop. If he fell asleep? If he screamed and cried? If he died? He’d keep going even then, maybe, because Tony’s not so different from a corpse these days and Steve doesn’t seem to care.

Tony remembers how to breath. The air expands his chest. In and out. It’s a tiring process. Ringing ears. Artificial darkness. Nothing but the company of his own heavy breathing. He feels heavy and slow. Opens his mouth, maybe to say Steve’s name, but it’s swallowed by the air. Too much effort. Just keep breathing. He wonders what Steve would do if he stopped.

He imagines Steve crying at his grave like Tony cried at his. It’s a pretty thought, a kind one. He likes to imagine that he still means something.

Steve is slowing now, his movements stuttering, his bruising grip relaxing. ‘Are you tired, Tony? Shall we stop?’ Steve climaxed without him noticing, he can feel it now, between his legs.

Tony only grunts.

‘I do love you, Tony, I hope you can see that,’ Steve’s voice is soft and there’s a kindness in him still that Tony had thought gone completely. But it’s no surprise really, Tony excels at seeing the worst in his loved ones.

‘The world will be better like this.’ Steve caresses his face and slowly moves the gag back in place, so gently that Tony hardly notices him doing it. ‘We’ve fought so many times before, but you’ll see. The more you see of this world, the more you’ll understand. This is for the best.’

\--

Tony is dying a little more everyday. He thinks that Steve is still beautiful sometimes. He has the same face Tony has always know. The same muscles, the same golden hair and soft smile. He walks and talks like Steve always has.

He treats Tony like he’s important. Tony is used to being someone. Flash of paparazzi bulbs, headline news, latest scandal, latest success. Someone has always been watching, looking for something from him. Never personal, just doing their job, just public interest, just, just, just. He tired of it. But this… it’s all personal. He hates it, but he’ll never tire of it.

Steve cleans him with a wet cloth and warm water, like Tony is an invalid. He enjoys the warmth, the soft cloth, the feeling of skin on skin and nothing sexual. He thinks he should hate it, but it’s calming, grounding, a real touch he can allow himself to feel as the rest of the world slowly fades away.

Steve removes the blindfold sometimes, claims he likes to see Tony’s eyes, gets all poetic about the colour of the sky. Today is one of those days. Steve sits at his bedside, pulls a book from his satchel. Its dust cover is neat and shiny, and Tony can hear the pages crinkle as Steve opens it. Hydra: A History Retold is printed in bold across the cover.

Steve reads it to him, his voice is soothing, beautiful, human. Tony hates the words but settles in to the sounds of it like ocean waves. It’s not language, just noise, a human voice breaking the silence.

Time feels slow, his brain does too, like he’s wading through sludge to grasp at every thought. Tony twists his neck, a little painful, but he can see Steve. The line of his brow is softer now, like it used to be. He would have liked to see Steve like this before.

He turns away, shuts it down. No thinking, Tony. Breathe, breathe, breathe. His breath falls into the same rhythm as Steve’s. He isn’t tired, but he’d like to be asleep.

Steve stops reading then. Watches him, his eyes fluttering. ‘That’s it, Tony, sleep now,’ Steve’s voice goes low and soft, lulling him to sleep. ‘Next time will be better, next time we can truly be together. Hail Hydra.’

\--

He wakes dizzy and breathless. His body feels heavy and his eyes itchy and sticky with sleep. Smell of disinfectant, feeling of an IV hooked up to his hand and restraints around his wrists.

‘Time to wake up, Avenger. You going to open your eyes again for me?’

Steve.

Tony opens his eyes and is greeted by Steve’s radiant smile.

‘Welcome back the land of the living, Tony.’

Tony smiles back.


End file.
